Agenda item

Frieda Buckley presented a petition and made a statement to the Panel on the subject of the Foxhill Regeneration & Development Charter. A summary is set out below and a copy of the statement can be found on the Panel’s Minute Book.

She said that she had carried out a petition regarding the Foxhill regeneration planned by Curo. She added that she was a member of the Foxhill Residents Association and also a committee member of the association and that she had their full support.

She informed the Panel that the petition had been signed by 338 residents to oppose the demolition of the homes and community of Foxhill, requests the upgrading of homes in need of improvement and is in favour of the rebuilding or upgrading of Dunster House, Selworthy and Bradford Park flats. She added that our Foxhill Residents Association survey shows that most of the tenants in the flats want their flats to be improved or rebuilt, whereas most of the tenants and owners of houses do not want to move.

She explained that in her view Foxhill was no longer a traditional council estate; it had become a peaceful village with a strong supportive community, a rare occurrence in our modern world. She said that some of the residents had lived there for sixty years and have paid rent to the council, Somer Housing and Curo for all those years – does that not count for something?

She acknowledged the need for more houses in our country but said that they should not be built on an existing, happy and thriving estate. She asked if the fact that 60% of the homes in Foxhill are owned by Curo was a valid excuse for wanting to destroy a peaceful community.

The Chairman thanked her for her statement and asked for the petition to be passed to the Cabinet Member for Homes & Planning so that they could issue a formal response. The other Panel members agreed with this proposal.

David Redgewell, South West Transport Network made a statement to the Panel regarding the Joint Spatial Plan. A summary is set out below and a copy of the statement can be found on the Panel’s Minute Book.

He said that he was concerned about a lack of a retail policy for the Bristol/Bath City Region and the need to regenerate the city centres of Bristol, Bath and Weston-Super-Mare. He stated that the sub-region needs a proper retail plan to go alongside the housing and economic policy. 

He said that to permit such a huge expansion of retail and other main town centre uses at an out-of-centre location goes against Government policy unless Cribbs Causeway is declared a new town or city centre under re-examination of the core strategy.

He stated that national and local planning policy requires that a sequential test is applied to proposals for main town centre uses that are not in an existing centre. The test requires applications to be located in town centres and only if suitable sites are not available should out-of-centre sites be considered.

He said that if this development goes ahead we would like to see a proper town centre/city centre for the Patchway/Cribbs Causeway, a new neighbourhood with more affordable housing, supermarket, bank and post office, improvements to the bus station and coach park and full operation of the Henbury loop with connections by MetroBus to Filton North, Henbury and Parkway stations and a higher density housing plan above the shops and car parks.

He said he was also concerned that the West of England Planning Board should be using its powers to allocate town centre development first especially protecting the City Centre of Bristol, Weston-Super-Mare town centre regeneration and Bath City Centre and Riverside especially with affordable housing and mixed use development. 

He stated that the lack of affordable rural housing is becoming a real issue in Gloucestershire and Somerset covered by the West of England Partnership.

He said that the Joint Strategic Plan had not been addressed appropriately through the West of England Scrutiny.

Councillor Barry Macrae asked if he was intending to make similar statements to the other Councils in the West of England.

Mr Redgewell replied that either he or colleagues would be making similar representations.

The Chairman thanked him for his statement.